Cooking

Its Monday so I have to report having made something. I thought about baking, but I'd only eat it and baked goods are not good for me.

After years of cooking for a family, I find cooking for one very difficult and tend to take the easy option of egg and something on toast (those baked goods again).

So tonight I had a poke in the fridge and found mushrooms, so made mushroom risotto, Carluccio style. There is enough here for several meals!

Still knitting

Its Monday so its time to blog about things made alongside other people in Natalie's network.

One of Ravelry's many strengths is the inspiration of seeing what other people have knitted.

And there are KALs (knitalongs) where everyone starts a pattern at the same time. And you can share problems and pleasures.

And then there are Mystery KALs where a designer releases the stages in a design over several weeks - or even months.

I have taken part in two of these -

• a mystery blanket, which I started in 2009 but have yet to finish. I like the design and the colour, but once you know where it is going the excitement wears off.
  And I subsequently realised that had I done this a year earlier or a year later, with more pictorial squares, I would not have liked the result nearly as much.
  
• a shawl which used lovely yarn and had interesting stitches, but I had to adapt as I didn't like the pictures of Robins picked out in beads.
  And when it was completed it was the wrong shape and size for me. So I gave it to Natalie as it showed her lovely yarn so well.

I should have learned from this that mystery knits are very risky.

Stephen West produces some spectacular scarves. So when he offered a mystery KAL I signed up.

And chose some of Natalie's Clan for the scarf.

However when the first clue came last week and I realised it was to be intarsia I decided it was not for me - I wanted something less fiddly after the wall hanging with 4 strands at a time.

So I looked at his other patterns and decided to knit Daybreak, a shawl with just two colours, knitted one at a time. I started it on Thursday and it has gone very quickly; by next Monday I hope it will be finished and blocked.

Making Monday

My friend Natalie has declared today a day for writing about something we have made.

And over the last week I have knitted this hanging for my Mum.

Jane Thornley challenged us to 'Knit a masterpiece' using a painting as a starting point. She set us off using one of Monet's waterlily paintings to knit a shawl.

But my Mum and I both love Les Coquelicots and knitting lends itself to impressionism, and this is the result.

Squint and step back from the screen and the source of inspiration is there.